ASM Gear box problems

[Captain]

Another thought...all bearings are NOT created equal.  The best bearings have an ABEC -3 rating.  Here is a quote from a popular definitions website :

"ABEC is an acronym for Annular Bearing Engineering Committee of the AFBMA (Anti-Friction Bearing Manufacturers Association Inc). The ABEC grades of bearings is a set of standards for the manufacturing tolerances of bearings. All quality manufacturers around the world manufacture to at least ABEC 1 standard. If you were to ask your local bearing supplier for a 608ZZ, you would almost certainly receive an ABEC 1 bearing."

There is certainly a price difference...and the originals that come in the B&P gearboxes are ABEC -1 as it is a "low RPM" gearbox.  The ABEC 3 rated bearings are typically many times the price of an ABEC 1 bearing.  In your situation with all other variables considered, I would not be using another new gearbox with ABEC 1 bearings.

Just for clarification, what is powering your ASM?  Gas or Electric?  What HP?

Captain

[LOGDOG]

"And then there are manufacturing tolerances, assembly errors, and operator errors to consider."


  This is a good place to start looking because it addresses the "human factor". I'd like to see more input from Farmer Bob on this post regarding what is and isn't the case. Were these all new gearboxes - 15 of them? Did he re-build one gearbox 15 times? Etc.... If they were new, surely you can rule out a bad run of gearboxes. I mean what are the chances that one guy - Famer Bob - would be the only guy in the world to get this bad run of gearboxes. Not likely. So I'd say toss that out.

  Is it necessarily operator abuse by Farmer Bob? Not necessarily if the problem began before FB took possession of the mill while in the care of the Factory Rep.

  Process of elimination requires that we ask the questions:

When? - When did the problem begin?
What? - What were you doing when the failure happened?
Where? - Where was the mechanical failure?
Was? - Was the machine properly aligned and maintained at the time of failure?
Why? - Why did the failure occur?
How? - How can you repair not only the failed machansim but also the stimulus or process that caused it to begin with?

  Actually, since the problem supposedly began prior to Farmer Bob, we'd actually need the Factory Rep who had the mill initially and first experienced the problem, to chime in here and comment. If what Farmer bob says is true, then only the Rep has the answer to the first 5 questions.

  Farmer Bob ...where is the next closest ASM to you. I would be curious if you could set them side by side and take measurements from one to the other to check tolerances and the assembly of your mill against one that is not having trouble?

   Hey Captain.  I see you just posted. Granted on this side of the discussion most of us don't know what is or isn't absolutely the case - but if indeed the failure began pre-Farmer Bob, don't you think we need to rewind things back to the early life of the mill and possibly a misalignment or manufacturing tolerance that is off? You're the troubleshooting engineer in the bunch. What would you have done at GM?

LOGDOG

[bandmiller2]

As logdog says we don't know the whole story.A blade with the wrong angle on the bits or even dull bits can soon overload the box and engine.Swing mills are designed to be light and portable and not really for constant commercial pounding,its use would have considerable bearing on its survival.Alot of us here take what are basically hobby mills, be they band or circular, and expect to make a living with them.My opinion Frank C.

[beenthere]

I may have shot from the hip with my origional statement about the gearbox not being heavy enough,.......................

.........Really after two years of problems and many replaced boxes Bob should have been given a new or rebuilt mill and an autopsy done on the old one at the factory.Frank C.

??? ???
As you said a couple times.........

we don't know the whole story

[James P.]

well I would like to hear more from farmer Bob as well. When I first read the post If what he said was true 15 gearboxes. Thats not 15 rebuilds. I would and did assume it was a cheap gearboxes. Well not necessarily. It usually comes down to the operators and our excuse is to usually blame the manufacturer. Like running a brush hog over stumps or cutting over sized brush. eventually somethings got to give. Even small gearboxes on John deere decks and other makes eventually need replacing if used commercially. bearings are replaceable for a reason. I  wonder if the machine was that out of alignment and was working the gearbox that hard. Wouldn't you notice it. I haven't a clue myself. Never seen a Peterson or other type mill in person besides a big circular.

[Farmer Bob]

Thanks to everone who responded to my predicament. I'd like to clarify some points and questions that have been raised.

I bought the mill to subsidise my income from my farm during these drought conditions here in Australia. The mill is set up in a shed in my backyard and is operated only by me. It runs between the hours of 8am and 5pm, 5 days a week, in conjunction with farming, so it is not working constantly. While on a trip to Australia, the manufacturer came to my home once the mill was assembled to make sure it was set up correctly and to teach me how to use it properly and all was correct then.

I only buy plantation pine logs to cut into sleepers 200 mil x 75 mil x2.4. The vertical cut at 75 mil, or 3", is made in one cut. The horizontal cut of 200 mil, or 8", is made in two cuts of 100 mil, or 4", each. I have never cut anything larger than this but do cut smaller sizes. I have not cut anything but pine nor have I used the slabber that came with the saw.

I use only the best quality Synthetic oil avaliable in Australia as recommended by Petersons. The mill has not been altered in any way. It is powered by a 27 HP Kohler petrol motor which was supplied with the mill. Everything is set up according to the Petersons manual and has been verified by Engineers, who have also stated it's aligned perfectly. They seem to think there's a deeper underlying problem. The blades are always sharpened after approximately 2 hours of use or sooner if necessary. The motor runs at maximum revs and never drops below 80% while cutting the timber, as I listen to the revs very closely on the motor to ensure I'm not cutting too quickly.

There have been 5 new gear boxes and one new casing. All the rest have been rebuilds by highly qualified Engineers. Petersons have replaced one gear box and the casing free of charge. All bearings that have been replaced are the C-3 bearings which is what Petersons recommend.

Does anyone know whether or not the torque produced by the 10" blade could be too powerful for the 1020 Bondioli and Pavesi gear box ???? This is the only option I haven't covered as yet although a few engineers have suggested the gear box could be too weak for the saw. From responses I've had, it appears there could be a problem with the 10" as no-one seems to have the same problem with the 8" which runs a 1018 gear box. Therefore the question on torque.

I have come to the forum as I'm at my wits end with this mill. It has cost me a fortune in rebuilds and lost income. I am very grateful for all the suggestions and will pass these on to my local Engineer. As the problem started with the agent at 60 hours before I purchased it at 120 hours - - -  then replaced the gear box again at 136 hours with the agents help at a cost to me - - - -  I'm inclined to think, like some of you, it may be a manufacturing problem. Most of your suggestions have already been addressed and ruled out as possibilities by Engineers.

Many thanks.
Farmer Bob

[bandmiller2]

Bob,I feel for you mate,you've been through alot.I would get rid of that sucker ideally to the manuf. for a ripper deal on a new one or try anouther brand or type of mill.Life is too short to put up with that.Frank C.

[LOGDOG]

Farmer Bob,

   Thanks for the added background on the mill. Cutting the material that you are you should have no problem as far as overloading the mill or it's components. I had the 27 H.P. Kohler on my 10" ASM and it did fine in fresh cut pine cutting small dimension lumber. Not so good in dimensions above 6" in width - especially in the horizontal plane for some reason. If I was cutting 10" wide material for instance I'd split the cut into two bites 5" wide each because the mill was pretty gutless if I tried to bury the whole 10" of the saw at one time. But I digress ...

   At this point this is what I would do. I would take your center unit out of the machine which should leave you with a pretty small unit that you could put in a crate. It's small enough that you should be able to air freight it from Australia to NZ at a reasonable charge and still get it back in a reasonable amount of time. I would send it to Petersons and have them strip your unit of the usable parts unrelated to the mechanisms that can influence load on the gear box (outside of sawing pressure) - anything that could influence the throw on the belts, create side load pressure because of misalignment -scrap. Have them mount your motor and salvageable hardware on a new center unit with a new gearbox. You guys work out who's going to pay for what.

   Even if you opt to sell this thing it needs to be in good working order so some other guy doesn't end up holding the bag with a machine that has issues. While I also had many issues with my ASM - the Petersons were pretty proactive as far as standing behind their parts. One of the things that complicated service issues is that they're in NZ and I was here on the other side of the world. It's not like you can hook your mill up to the truck and cart it down there, drop it off, say "fix this", and come back to pick it up when they're done. The distance between the manufacturer and the customer makes service impractical. I'm sure if a guy was in NZ and near them they'd be more than happy to give things a hands on approach as far as service is concerned. Unfortuantely in many cases it's just not possible because of the distance. So crate that thing up and send it off. I know it'll be expensive but trying to get it done locally hasn't been cheap or effective either.


Maybe Peterson can help you find some low cost shipping options back and forth? Might be something to suggest ...

LOGDOG

[Meadows Miller]

Gday

And welcome to the forum Bob where abouts are you located Mate  ??? we've got another Aussie  ;) ;D ;D 8) 8)

Im sorry about the reason your here but i hope you will stick aorund Mate  ;) ;D

I 'll tell you that breaking down somtimes is part of this game  ;) But it would'nt have gotten to 5 rebuilds with me before i cracked  and just sent it back untill the thing came back running like it should  ;) Its very rare but 15 times out of your own pocket in 2/3 years is just a bloody joke we are not talking about a $10 part here something should have been done about it by now  thats about $1000 once every 4 to 6 weeks    :( >:( >:(

how many hours is on the mill total ?? if you took the cost of repairs ,downtime lost production (income/profit) over the last couple of years  you would easly cover the cost of the mill  ;)
It might be time to cut your losses  park the mill and start negotiating  a solution  to the issue weather that be getting a wpf demo mill onhire or anew center unit with just the gearbox and the swing assembly  or  somthing like that  ??? while you send yours back to the factory for a full strip down and going over somthing might have been running or welded alittle out of whack thats just going to keep chewing through Your wallet  ??? : Or it might even be time to start looking around for another mill either way you cant keep working with a mill thats  unreliable somthing needs to be done Mate  ;)



Regards Chris

[Tom]

Chris,
The mill is second hand and the manufacturer has already bent over backward to try to help get the problem resolved.  That includes providing new parts, redesigned parts and engineering advice.  The problems haven't all been confronted by the manufacturer because other mechanics have been used to do repairs, fixes, whatever.

Putting the onus on the manufacturer, in this situation, doesn't seem to be right thing to do, to me.  Especially when it sounds as if help has been for the asking.

I personally know the manufacturer owners and know them to be friendly and fair.  They are also a sponsor on this forum and have been super nice to all of the members.  It just doesn't sound to me as if this whole problem should be tossed off onto them.

Farmer bob was upfront in saying that he didn't want to turn this into a bashing; that he was only interested in getting a resolution to the problem so that he could fix it.   I think it best for all of us to keep our advice directed toward the mechanics of the problem and leave the customer/manufacturer relationship out of it.

[firefighter]

I have been reading all the posts on this matter and I agree with what Tom is saying .

[Farmer Bob]

Chris

I'm in South Gippsland.

Tom

Yes, phone help has always been avaliable to me and the manufacturer even had a phone conversation with one of the Engineers on site while he worked on the gear box. And yes, as I've stated they have supplied me a gear box and a casing free of charge.

The only reason I've had to have other Engineers work on this is because we don't have a company rep here to help me. Unfortunately on a recent trip to Australia by the manufacturer / owner of the company I was unable to afford the costs involved in having him call on me, nor can I afford to pack up the mill and ship it back as has been suggested.

I came to the forum hoping someone may be able to provide some first hand experience or knowledge on how or what can be done to solve this issue.

Bob

[James P.]

Farmer Bob I still am not clear what has happened to the gearbox. the bearings have failed. gears have failed. Could you possibly take pictures of this gearbox . do you have one which is damaged. or have the damaged parts. is the housing wallowed out. seals shot. Just doesn't make any sense that this thing has been lined up as you say and has these issues unless you are over looking something. I personally can't believe this to be that difficult of a fix .

[sgschwend]

I know you have had a lot of inputs, I have been studying swing mills with the interest of perhaps building one.  Well in my studies I found that the power rating of the gear box varies with rpm.  You may want to take a look at those specifications. 

In other words from my memory the power the gear box can handle drops very quickly with the drop in rpm.  Like a factor of 10, which is a steep drop!  Yep 1/10 the horse power when turning at a low rpm.

I do not know if you have put a load (or even if it is possible to do so) on your gear box in a stalled or low rpm condition, but if so you probably have damaged it.

[Wife]

Hey guys

Thought I'd finally add to the conversation, which I have been watching closely, but with great sadness. A great big thank you to those of you who have been very fair, unbiased and helpful. There are a lot of very smart guys on here who have dropped many ideas that are dead-on.

Yes, we can offer more information. Husband has spent many hours helping our customer Farmer Bob, but there are some important clues and events missing, and we still need more information which we have asked for. I will try to be as fair as possible without standing on anyone's toes – I apologize in advance if the toe still hurts afterwards – but new shoes do need breaking in.

The mill is a 2006 model. The first owner's gearbox bearing failure was caused by our factory guy who admitted over tightening the belts. Duh on us. We replaced it under warranty without question, and the owner gave us no indication there were any further issues with it when he on-sold the mill privately in 2007.

We are only aware of TWO full gearbox replacements by our current owner this year in 2009 – the earlier repairs have obviously been rebuilds by others, which we don't have the full details of.

Farmer Bob was always keen to learn, but with great respect and by his own admission, is not all that mechanically minded. So Husband has been to his site for personal training at the beginning, plus spent many hours over the phone training on further maintenance and troubleshooting in general. We've been patient and caring nonetheless, and have certainly not given up on him at any time.

When Husband trained Farmer Bob at the beginning in 2007, there were no apparent issues with the gearbox and the mill performed correctly. We later have record of one incorrect gearbox rebuild in early 2008 causing several associated adjustment problems, which we eventually helped diagnose over the phone, and the original owner even went to his site to help rectify it. This is the only one we are aware of that damaged the bottom bearing as it wasn't shimmed and realigned correctly. As posted by AusLJW on Feb 17th 2008;

[Hello. Put in a big day on Saturday and fixed the ASM.  Owner had re-removed gearbox to replace a leaky seal so I put it back with no shims. Cut the first log and hey presto, no overcut grooves.  It took a long time to get the rest of the adjustments right. The main culprit being the blade flip mechanism.  I think the problem was that when the Ag engineer removed and repaced the gearbox he didn't note or mark the position of the bottom bearing.  He must have just put it back on without considering how sensitive the machine would be to this.  The owner had spent hours adjusting the machine around this mis-aligned bearing so things were way off.]

Our notes indicate there was another rebuild in Aussie where the Engineer didn't do it quite right again and the circlip fell out.

In 2008 we were also advised the pivot bracket may have become bent, and we quoted for a replacement one, but I don't think it was ever purchased. Continuing to operate with a bent pivot system could cause many issues, and this concerns me. Yes, we did offer to travel to Farmer Bob's at one stage (at cost only), but unfortunately that wasn't taken up.

2009 - One of the recent new gearboxes on record Farmer Bob paid for, and the other we paid for without question when it failed prematurely. We also sent another repair kit for free as well, as we were told shortly after it arrived that a seal was leaking on that one too. Then after speaking to the Bondi guys in Aussie, we were told the failures were due to excessive side loading at the topside, as the actual housings were being warped out of shape at the entry shaft. This has never happened to any other gearbox in the history of our mills. If it's not due to over-tightened belts, its due to jamming the blade in the log, blade badly out of adjustment, operating at low rpm stressing the box, or some other stress we still don't know about. Farmer Bob was very honest and personally advised me in two separate conversations that the operator did tend to jam in the log at times. Made sense. With all respect to the Aussies, we do have a few harsh operators there! So being the nice person my Husband is, he spent some extra money and designed a special strengthening bracket with a secondary outrigger bearing to go on the input shaft, so that those excessive side loads would not damage the gearbox. This was sent to Farmer Bob recently with another housing kit for free, and he was asked that it be installed, with feedback back to us. We also advised we would not pay for any more gearboxes until the previous failed ones were returned to us for inspection per our warranty procedures. We were then saddened to receive an angry email labeled without prejudice, threatening to contact the competition and to take further action, and the next we knew this post was started.

We've recently asked for a progress report on the upgrade, but only got another angry response – I can understand your frustrations Farmer Bob, but we can't help fix them if we aren't kept in the loop. We still don't know if the upgrade was even installed, and we still have none of the failed parts returned to us. I think my Husband has gone waaaay beyond the call of normal warranty. We'd love to help get you going again Farmer Bob, but we can't do that without co-operation from both sides. Please Farmer Bob, can you start talking to us amicably again and respond to our email?

Any other questions to me, I would be more than happy to answer.

[James P.]

Geeze Wife, if I had the dough I would by a Peterson just cause I like your attitude. That said I am broke so thats just a compliment. I hope farmer Bob takes your kind offer up and I hope you guys get it worked out for him. We all relies as customers at one point or another we can be demanding at least speaking for myself and I am unanimous in that. All joking aside I have only heard good things about Peterson and from people who I believe have alot of integrity

[LOGDOG]

Quoting Paul Harvey, "Now you know the rest of the story."

Thanks "Wife" for chiming in and adding clarity to the scenario.

Hopefully Farmerbob can put frustrations aside, open the lines of communication up again, and get this thing lined back up. Farmerbob, send them back the parts they've asked you to and give them the chance to diagnose the problem and if necessary do the right thing by replacing something. I can honestly say that they did well by me in that respect. I know how frustrating it is when you're broke down and money is tight and you can't seem to get a machine back in alignment. But you cannot let it get the best of you. Something that everyone who is considering buying a sawmill must remember:

1) If you're not mechanically inclined, be prepared for frustration. You'll need to become mechanically inclined quick. It just goes with equipment.

2) If money is tight to begin with, don't buy a sawmill. Rarely is that the answer to a man's money problems. For a few yes, in general -no. There will be a need to spend money continually after the purchase of a mill. Blades, service, maintenance items, support equipment, insurance, logs, maybe a vehicle to tow it, trailers, a building, etc, etc. - it never ends.

   You have to be prepared to do whatever it takes to push through - if you want to be in that business or any business for that matter. Sometimes that even means us putting our pride and frustrations aside. Been there done that.

Hope you guys can work this out. I believe you can.


LOGDOG

[firefighter]

Now we have both sides of the story ,I am glad that the manufactuer has given us what we wanted to hear and I hope Farmer Bob gets the info and parts to you as you have asked for .It seem this could have been settled with out having to use this means and hopefully there are no more posts about this .

[Meadows Miller]

Gday

I did do a reply to this last night but my session timed out and I lost it  :

Tom I was'nt trying to bash the Peterson mills (they do build a nice one ;) ) I was looking at it from the point of view that all the trouble shooting and adjustments that could be made  had been done  Mate  ;) That been said I have loved the Wpf mills i have had the opertunity to have a swing on over the years and was looking at getting a wpf with all the trimmings before i got the lucas last year aswell but Like james money was tight and i could only get $10k cash together at that time  ;) James dont worry your not the only one Mate  ;)  :D ;D

Kerris I do know that ppl overloading the mill and trying to lift  feed speeds to try and get more production just overloads the whole mill saw, driveline & motor and that goes for any mill  It just does'nt work ive seen it all too often !! ;) the big gains in any mill afer having your saw unit runing spoton and easily  ;) are from How the whole sawmill is setup, Decision making, quick setts and keeping the saw in the wood  ;)

and Whats that we have some Bloody Rough Operators overehere do we    :  ;) :D :D :D :D Must be why I get offered some bloody good jobs & money  2to3 times every year all over aust  ;) :D ;D 8) A good Sawyers hard to come by these days in any country    : But i got out of that afew years ago as for every good mill owner i worked for  i had to deal with an Idiot or two  ??? : :  ;)  :D :D

Bob your not too far from me and ill be down your way in about 3 weeks looking at a another sawmill with my business partner  and i can drop past and have a looksee if you like Mate  ??? 
If you take Kerris up on her offer and get in contact with them  ;) and have the parts there i might be able stay down a day or two and give you a hand to try and get the thing sorted  Mate  ;)

And dont worry I wont be handing you an invoice at the end of it  ;) :D I just want to see you up and running w/out the dramas Mate  ;) ;D 8) 8)

Oh and Kerris say gday to Aaron for me you have a top bloke working for you there  ;) ;D ;D 8) 8)

Regards Chris

[Farmer Bob]

I hope I will be able to post this reply as there are a few facts I would like to correct.

It has never been my aim to "bash" Petersons and I've always maintained without the gear box issues that keep rising I have been very happy with my saw. For two years the dialouge between Petersons and myself, both by phone and email has never ceased and the only reason I sought legal advise was when I kept recieving emails quoting the manufacturers warranty conditions, hence the few emails headed 'without predjudice,' on advice. However this has not been the road I wish to go do down so I quickly dropped the idea and the email headers. That was when I decided to come to the forum to see if anyone else could come up with a solution or idea that has not been attempted.

In September this year I took the damaged parts to Bondioli and Pavesi in Melbourne hoping that they, as the actual gear box manufacturer, could help. They also had contact with Petersons and agreed to send the parts back to NZ but are still waiting for certain information from Petersons before sending them. Both of us have sent emails reminding Petersons that the parts they want returned are still there. That side of it is completely out of my hands.

Yes, the very first repair I had done, on the first gear box to go, was done by a mechanic who didn't do it right and the circlip did fall out but since then I have used only very qualified Engineers because I am the first to admit I have very little mechanical knowlege and at 58 years old
am happy to let the profesionals do their job.

I am the operator of my mill and have not said anyone else jams it but have admitted I did jam it myself once in the early days, so consequently now listen very carefully to the revs, as I've said in a previous posting.

I have NEVER solicitored help from "the opposition" as was claimed, but I have been contacted by another mill manufacturer offering to help me, for which I'm very grateful. I am not an angry person  . . . . it's a very wasted emotion the serves no one, . . .but I let Petersons know I was disappointed that others are offering the help I had hoped they might have offered.


Unfortunately the costs involved in flights, labour and accomodation required when Petersons were visiting our State was something I could not afford. I understand it is their policy to charge for these calls but had hoped that as they had already made the 3 hour trip to Australia and were only a couple of hours drive away from me, and with the persistant problems I've been having, they would have called on me without this cost.

Please Petersons, get the parts from Bondioli and Pavesi, as arranged, and anylise and solve the problem.

Thanks.
Bob